Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a wireless communication system, and more particularly, to a method and apparatus for performing and supporting device-to-device (D2D) communication.
Related Art
Device-to-device (D2D) communication is a communication scheme in which a direct link is established between a plurality of devices (e.g., user equipments (UEs)) to directly exchange voice, data, or the like without an intervention of an evolved NodeB (eNB). The D2D communication may include UE-to-UE communication, peer-to-peer communication, etc. In addition, the D2D communication may be applied in machine-to-machine (M2M) communication, machine type communication (MTC), etc.
The D2D communication is considered as one method capable of solving an eNB overhead depending on data traffic which increases rapidly. For example, according to the D2D communication, unlike the conventional wireless communication system, data is exchanged between devices without an intervention of the eNB, thereby being able to decrease a network overload.
In addition, with the introduction of the D2D communication, there may be an advantageous effect such as a decrease in a procedure of the eNB, a decrease in power consumption of devices participating in D2D, an increase in a data transfer rate, an increase in a network accommodation capacity, a load distribution, a cell coverage expansion, etc.